Dartmouth BlackLivesMatter Tear Down BlueLivesMatter Bulletin Board

There is a weeks long process for approval of any bulletin board items at Dartmouth College…a process that College Republicans fully complied with for a “BlueLivesMatter” display to honor police officers who risk their lives to keep people safe. The BlackLivesMatter group tore them down, put up their own in its place and then assigned students to guard it.

Free Speech? What Free Speech?

Though the College Republicans were subjected to a long bureaucratic process to post their display, the administration hastily approved a nearby bulletin board for the BlackLivesMatter group. Not that it mattered, as the #BLM group had already taken over the Republican’s bulletin board and weren’t about to let anyone get to it.

Photo via DartReview

The BlueLivesMatter display was put up, coincidentally, after a presentation the night before of “They Shoot Black People, Don’t They?” by Keith Knight.

Enraged by the use of the hashtag #BlueLivesMatter, the #BlackLivesMatter activists put up flyers that said “You Cannot Co-opt the Movement Against State Violence to Memorialize its Perpetrators #BlackLivesMatter.”

The College Republicans were “advised against” taking down the opposing display. The campus Safety and Security planned to take down the flyers after 2 am when the Collis Student Center had closed for the night.

Belief

BlackLivesMatter sent an email to College President Phil Hanlon that read in part,

We have reclaimed the board. We are reclaiming our space, in Collis, in Class, and on this Campus. We have proclaimed “Black Lives Matter”—we do in fact matter, and we are here.

Fuck your comfort, there is no such thing as neutral existence. Sitting in the library with your headphones in, intensifies this violence against people of color, muting the voices of the movement, the cries of your peers, and the history of inequality. Posting Blue Lives Matter reproduces the idea that All lives matter, again intensifying the violence against people of color. Invalidating individual realities.

We occupy this space, in front of the bulletin board, to guarantee our presence at this institution. Reposting Blue Lives Matter reproduces this violent narrative against people of color, by silencing us. We will not be silenced.

School administration meets with #BLM students – photo via DartReview

Last year, BlackLivesMatter protesters stormed in the Dartmouth student library and began chanting and shouting. which is the reference in their note to the ‘library.’

Response

Then the College Republicans responded to their email with one of their own for BlueLivesMatter:

Yet, when it came time to enforcing these protections for students on the other side of the political spectrum, there was only deafening silence. In fact, after much discussion, we were told by Safety & Security and Collis leadership that restoring our display would put us in violation of College policy and that we would be subject to punishment by Dartmouth Judicial Affairs. While our posters were kept off the bulletin boards (at least until 2 AM when Collis closes), theirs were allowed to remain unchecked with no repercussions. In fact, they were given expedited permission to have their posters placed in Collis. This group was granted approval within hours, while we had to schedule almost a month in advance.

No reasonable answers

Students on both sides were targeted on social media and pictures of some of the college Republicans were defaced. And though the college says it believes in “free speech” and “civil dialogue,” it is not likely to occur as long as #BlackLivesMatter hate continues.

Belief is a powerful thing. The belief that whites are racist and evil, and that police officers are agents of oppression, empowers the BlackLivesMatter movement. As long as those seeds are in it, their goals can only result in politically correct answers that are not answers at all. Hate begets hate.

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